Pakistan’s highest court has ordered the release of Imran Khan, the country’s former prime minister, who has been in custody since his dramatic arrest on Tuesday.
The country’s Supreme Court on Thursday afternoon ruled Mr Khan’s arrest to be illegal.
Mr Khan was dragged from a courtroom in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, on Tuesday, as he appeared to face corruption charges. He denies the charges.
He has since been held at a police compound in Islamabad where a judge on Wednesday ordered the 70-year-old opposition leader could be detained for at least another eight days.
Pakistan’s top court on Thursday ordered the anti-graft agency to release Mr Khan from its custody, broadcaster Geo TV reported.
Clashes with police in the country since Mr Khan’s dramatic arrest on Tuesday have killed at least eight of his supporters and left dozens injured.
Five of the deaths were reported in north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, two in the eastern city of Lahore and one person was killed in the south-western city of Quetta.
More than 200 police officers were also injured.
Hundreds of supporters of Mr Khan were arrested in raids overnight on Wednesday, while the violence saw demonstrators burn down a railway station on the outskirts of Islamabad.
Police said that nearly 1,600 of Mr Khan’s supporters were arrested on charges of damaging public property and attacking military installations.
In one incident, hours after Mr Khan’s arrest, a mob set fire to the sprawling residence of a top army commander in the eastern city of Lahore.
Also on Thursday, police filed new terrorism charges against Mr Khan and top leaders from his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party on charges of inciting mobs to violence.
They said the mobs attacked military installations, damaged public property, burned down dozens of police vehicles, attacked police officers and disrupted life by blocking key roads and highways.
In an address to the nation late on Wednesday, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, who took over after Mr Khan was ousted in April last year in a no-confidence vote in Parliament, said the outbreak of violence was “unforgivable.”
He said: “Such scenes were never seen by the people of Pakistan. Even patients were taken out of ambulances and ambulances were set on fire.”
Following the violence, the government has shut down schools, colleges and universities in the eastern Punjab and north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces, where Mr Khan has a massive grassroots following.
The government also suspended internet service in various parts of the country.
